Madness
by elfinmyth
Summary: Locked away from the outside world, Lord Voldemort tries to cope with his own mind, trying not to think of the one he killed. But how will he cope when suddenly hauled out of that prison by the same person he thought dead? A story of the struggle to forgiveness HPLV


**Madness.**

I actually had a part of this on my computer for... well I guess it's almost a year now... Shizzles happened and I really couldn't find it in me to continue this before, but I finally managed to finish it. ^^

I hope that you all like this fic, and that the ending doesn't seem** too** rushed. If anyone has questions about it afterwards, you're of course always free to ask :)

Disclaimer: Merlin, first time I think of this in... ahum. a very long time. Don't own anything, except myself.. wait, damn it, I belong to someone else too -.-'' Really don't own anything then.

Also, while I have separated the 'big' scenes with a horizontal line, I have not done so with the first few, and separated those with ~.~.~.~.~ because it was horrible to read otherwise, and these are all small cutscenes of the first, large one.

Enjoy!

* * *

Lord Voldemort smiles, a wry, humourless smile filled with self-mocking. Closing his eyes, he tries to stop the flow of images that have haunted his mind for innumerable years. _(Time slipping away, dreams and reality blurring)_ Madness… the term had been used to describe him before. The fools had never known what true madness was. They probably never would._(The images, God, the images) _**They** would never end up in this hell-hole. He has long given up on trying to retain his composure, to try and keep his expression blank, and thus he flinches and grimaces when a particularly dreadful memory flashes before his eyes. _(Drowned bodies reaching for him, cold, wet hands trying to grasp his robes, accusing stares.)_They are coming again, and he can't stop the cold sweat that runs over his skin, nor the trembling of his lips and fingers. _(You killed us.)_

He sucks in a breath with a sobbing sound as a cold, dead hand touches his cheek and the smell of rotting flesh burns its way into his nostrils. He tries to think, to escape to his dream world, but he can't, and the pain clouds his vision.

_(Blood. His own blood, dripping from his own hands. Red on white. Empty emerald eyes, so dull that one could think the boy was dead. Flashes of darkness, silent tears that dripped on a bed in an old orphanage, masked people who turned away from him, crushing the loyalty they had sworn. And there were the eyes again. The eyes of a haunted mind.)_

He gasps again and claws fruitlessly in the air like he has done so often. Syllables of a terrible language befoul his lips, but the creature ignores him. He is in no position to order anyone around anymore, and words of pleading and mercy cannot be expressed in that tongue. They simply do not exist. He slumps forward, causing his chains to rattle. He can still feel the presence of that horrifying thing in the cell, but the worst has passed for now. _(You know the nightmares will return) _Dread settles in his stomach when a small voice in the back of his head reminds him of the fact that it will be back again soon, that it will never be over, that he will see those eyes again a million times more._ (A million? Infinite is a better term.)_

He shakes his head and flexes his fingers again, but the metal that ties his wrists brutally to the wall will not give. Of course it will not, he's tried it so often. Voldemort clenches his jaw when another image of that green, dead look swims in the darkness before his eyes. He wishes that he could see, to be able to concentrate on something else, something insignificant; it doesn't matter, as long as he won't see** those** again. _(Cold as ice, yet fragile like glass) _A chill sweeps past him and he nearly weeps with joy for the small mercy of a few minutes without the constant torture of his past.

~.~.~.~.~

_He is floating in a dark abyss, and a small light burns in the darkness. He tries to laugh and reaches out to it, seeing his own bony hands push through the murky water. He speeds up, desperate to reach the light. It has been so long since he has seen, so long since he has felt anything but cold, rough stone scraping against his back and arms. The light is far away, too far, but with desperate attempts he tries to reach the light, never hesitating. Finally, **finally** he is there, and salt mingles with the black liquid around him. With trembling fingers, he touches the small glowing spot, but then it starts to spin and horror washes over him when it changes colour. It stops spinning and the eyelid opens._

_A blank green eye_

He screams.

~.~.~.~.~.~

How long has he been here? How long has it been since the world celebrated his downfall? How long since the final battle, when the boy _(Don't think of that) _had turned around _(Stop!)_ and stared at him. He feels something wet drip from his hands where his nails have dug in his own palms. Pain against pain. Physical pain to replace the mental torture. It is a small price to pay. Perhaps he will even bleed to death_ (But even in death you will never know rest)_

He closes his eyes _(As if it makes a difference)_ when a freezing wind soils the air.

~.~.~.~.~.~

_He stumbles through the mud, in a desperate attempt to escape the hands, the harsh beatings. Rage boils through his veins. They will pay. They will all pay for the humiliation, for the pain, the disgrace. He balls his fists and turns around, directing his hateful glare at the large building that stands out against the dark sky, prominent even through the heavy rain. Power rises in him and he lifts an arm. At the very moment he wants to unleash it though, a rock strikes his head and he falls down. The spark disappears and he is left at the mercy of the taunting children. The first hand rises to strike…_

_~.~.~.~.~.~_

He wonders if he is awake. He opens his eyes and closes them again, but there is no difference. He can't tell if his limbs are numb or on fire, and his head spins. He quivers, feeling miserable, and light spots dance before his eyes. It almost makes him smile. For his subconscious to remember a thing as light so vividly, while he can't even begin to try and remember the sun _(Oh, and how often he has tried…)_ but smile he does not, for the lights hurts him and he tries to blink them away._ (Fever…)_ He knows he is ill, but if anything, the thought only makes him more miserable. There is no-one who cares, _(Nagini, I need you.)_, no-one who will try to ease his pain. _(Have they killed her?)_ He is utterly and completely alone. And aside from** her**, no-one has ever cared either.

_(Now that is not completely true is it?)_ Shut it._ (Don't you remember him?) _Quiet!_ (The one who cared?)_ Leave me alone!_ (You betrayed him.)_

_(Shattered lifeless eyes.)_

~.~.~.~.~.~

_The forest around him is blurry and an unimaginable thirst rises within him. He wants to claw at his throat to replace the feeling, but to his horror he finds that he has no hands. Memories of someone else fill his brain, and he has no choice but to surrender to the disgusting tangle of confusing emotions of the other's mind. Fear. He had never thought that he would have to experience that again. He had grasped every chance of lessening his humanity to not feel weak again, to not have to bow to fear again, and now this idiotic, pathetic human forces him to feel it. He hates the fear. It is perhaps the only thing he is truly afraid of. Fear itself._

_~.~.~.~.~.~_

'Something has changed…' It is his first coherent thought in what could be months. He _(What is his name again? A name… my name…) _struggles to recapture his sanity. _(Was there ever sanity to begin with?) _Slowly, he moves, and then it strikes him like lighting (_Lightning, a lightning-like scar…) _He can move. He can** move**. Skin scrapes against stone, but this time it is not the skin on the back of his hands, but his palm and wrist that are chafed by the stone. The smell of death has not left_ (And neither has the chill…)_ so he guesses that he is still within his cell. _(Why was I captured again?)_

He pushes himself up on hands and knees and ignores his protesting muscles, which are weak from years of neglect. _(Decennia? Centuries? Oh what does it matter…)_ Something stamps on his back and he barely has time to cover his head before he crashes to the ground again. Harsh sounds that he vaguely recognises _(Think!)_ but can't understand batter on his ears. He is not used to anything but the silence and the occasional rattling breath of Fear. _(Rotting hands, covered in crusts) _Something grabs his neck and pulls him up in sitting position. In a weak attempt to fend his attacker off, he raises his arm, but it immediately falls back. He is tired, so very tired. _(How welcome the eternal sleep that I always tried to escape would be now…)_ Ruthless sounds fill the room again, and sluggishly, his mind begins to register words.

"Up, you freak, get up!"

He tries not to flinch at the word, but voices and faces drift to the surface of his mind _(Cruel, taunting faces, bloody letters carved into his chest. the screaming that is torn from his throat.)_ He struggles to get to his feet, searching the wall with his hands, the same walls that have prevented his escape this whole time_ (But really, were it not really the walls of your mind that did that?) _The one who had pushed him down now grabs one of his arms and starts dragging him away. For a moment, he feels sadness, and a laugh escapes his lips at the absurdity of it all. That he would feel sadness of all things when finally able to leave his prison!_ (Insanity, that is called.)_ After minutes of being pushed and pulled around, of scuffling forward and leaning on walls around him to guide his way, of stumbling on stairs in the unbearable darkness, a strange smell reaches his nose, and melancholy fills him. _(Grass. Sea.)_

He is outside.

The weight of that revelation crashes down upon him, but he isn't given the time to think about it more. A rough hand grabs his arm in a painful hold and for the first time in years, the familiar feeling of being pushed through a narrow, rubber tube overtakes him. Surprisingly enough, he remains upright when his feet find cold, hard stone. Marble. (_A ruined marble staircase, broken figures lying at the bottom in a twisted heap_) Nonetheless, he sways a bit and in a reflex, he tries to grab something to hold onto with one hand, but the shackles that tie his wrists together prevent him from doing so, hindering his movements.

Something pokes in his back. (_His own wand, two halves lying on a table, people with nameless faces condemning him to a life without magic.)_ He snarls at the memory, a raw, desperate snarl. The time without the Dementors, _(finally, he can recall their name, their presence had pushed everything away but the constant fear.),_ no matter how short, is already affecting his confidence and anger. Nevertheless, he is too weak now to defy the man who is ordering him around and thus he stumbles forwards, vaguely wondering where he is. Voices come his way, but he pays them no heed, even when they abruptly stop as he passes them. Once, he had held all the power in the world… what is left of him now? What do they see that can still make them remember the fear they once held for him? His mouth twists into a distorted smile. Blindfolded, shackled, broken. A bruised and bleeding monster is all that remains of the great Lord Voldemort. They have no reason to fear him… yet he has every reason to fear them. _(You would still have all the power if you hadn't betrayed-)_

He cuts off the voice with a sneer. At last, they stop and he is pushed down on something that feels like a couch. Too caught up in the arduous task of silencing the voices in his head, he does not hear the conversation that takes place in the room. That is, until someone else speaks up. The man barely speaks three words, but it is enough to pierce his chest with something akin to a cold dagger. He tries to struggle for breath and stop his limbs from shaking, but images assault him again_. (The boy, just standing there, taking in the cruel, mocking words. Voldemort's own heart clenching, but unable to stop the flow of words, a flow he would never be able to take back.) _

Chairs scrape over the floor as the people who had occupied them get up and leave. He can feel their hostile glares, but they don't matter to him. There is only one person who truly matters. A silence falls over the room, one he does not wish to break, to avoid the ghosts of his past. It is impossible… (_What had previously been a dull, empty look has now fully turned into lifeless.)_ He should be dead. _(The eyes of the corpse are still open, but nothing remains, not a glimpse of a soul present.)_ Killed by his own hand, to complete the act of utter betrayal. _(So you recognise your treachery now?)_

"Voldemort."

The man cringes at his name. _(Masses of cloaked people, shouting his name at the height of his glory, yet abandoning him without a thought when weakness befalls him.) _

"Tom."

_(His father and grandparents, their motionless bodies facing the ceiling.)_

~Harry~ he whispers, finally acknowledging the name that goes with the flashes of green eyes. Soft footsteps approach him and after a word and a click, the accursed metal band that has covered his eyes throughout his imprisonment falls to the ground with a sharp clanking noise. He screws his eyes shut and covers them with an arm to block out the bright light that floods the room. It takes a while to become accustomed to it again, but when he can finally keep his eyes open, he decides to not stall any longer and looks up to meet the eyes that have haunted him all those years.

A sob of relief escapes his lips.

They are not how he remembers them to be.

There is a spark in them once more. Of what emotion, he cannot quite determine, but there is a spark, and that is enough. Long, black hair falls past the boy's shoulders. No… man. He has grown into a man now. _(A grow I never witnessed. Lost years, all because of my own damned fear.)_ Years of abuse and malnourishment have left their traces, but time has washed away most of it, he sees. ~Harry~ he repeats. ~How?~

Harry frowns, as if he can't understand the question, and a rough, tanned hand comes up, lightly stroking his cheek. "Speak in English." Comes the soft reply, and Voldemort struggles to find his voice. He has spoken nothing but Parseltongue and attempts to find nonexistent words for compassion in the language of the Dementors.

"How?" The word sounds strange and hoarse, but Harry's look tells him that the man understood him. "I killed you." He flinches at his own words, but, like before, they are impossible to take back.

"Very simple. I beat death, through your own means." The man replies. Voldemort stares at him in wonder as Harry crouches down and takes his cold hands in his own.

"I only found out after my death. I was your soul."

Nothing more needs to be said, and a waterfall of blurred emotions cascade over him. _(a diary, a locket, a ring, a cup, a tiara… all blackened, broken, destroyed. Only Nagini remained, his ever-faithful companion.) _"You… a Horcrux?"

"The one you never meant to make." the man admits. "But that is not why I brought you here."

The voice is harsher now, and yet there is a gentle undertone, a tiny pinprick of light. Voldemort keeps silent, not knowing with what words he could possibly break the silence.

"The rest all think that I'm mad, you know… first because I demanded that they lock you up instead of kill you…."

_(Oh, and what mercy that has been.)_ sarcasm and loathing fills him inside, but deep down he knows that this man, still a boy when he made the decision, only did what he thought was best for him, his murderer. Inherent goodness has always been a part of Harry Potter, and it will always be.

"And now, to get you out of Azkaban after so many years… But they never knew what we had. I never told them because of your betrayal."

"Then why do you wish to see me now?" The only raspy word that really gets past his lips is a shaky 'Now', but Harry understands what he means either way. The man hesitates, but then brushes his fingers against Voldemort's cheek in an almost frantic and obsessed gesture that is way too familiar.

"_Harry… why is it you always do that?" (A stern gaze, followed by a light giggle from the boy on top of him and a timid smile.)"You feel so fragile. If I don't regularly check if you're still here, you might disappear one day." (A growl, and he pushes the boy off him.) "Watch your tongue ,pet. Fragile…" he mutters._

He is shocked back into the present when he hears his name being called.

"Voldemort? Hey, don't faint…"  
His eyes slowly focus again on the figure in front of him, who is watching him with concern right now."Are you alright again?"

He answers with a shaky smile, more a twitch of his lips than anything else, but even after all this time, Harry can read him as well as always, and relaxes again.

"I found it. After all these years, I finally found a reason to not hate you anymore for what you did to me, to all of us."

confusion whirls in his head, and his memory does not provide any information on what Harry could be talking about. Not that that says much… His memory had has more and more gaps lately… the past years, in fact.

"I never knew that you still kept diaries." the man gently says. "But last week, I went back to our…" his voice breaks, but it is quickly covered up by a cough. "To the house."_(a dark silhouette against a barely lighter sky, the fortress he called his home.)_ "The place was broken down mostly, but the bedroom was still intact, mostly. _(the bedroom… all those nights they had spent there. all those nights in which he had fallen deeper and deeper, while he had been trying to deny it.) _Once the dust was removed, one almost wouldn't say that more than twenty years had passed."

"Twenty?" he asks. He doesn't know whether he thought it to be a longer or a shorter period that he sat in prison. On some days, he could almost convince himself that his mind was just playing tricks on him and that it was only yesterday that they had put him in there, but other days… it seemed an eternity had passed.

"Twenty-two, to be exact. It's 2018 now. The fifth of May."

"You're thirty-eight." Voldemort concludes after a minute of thinking.

"Yes. And you're…"

_(Too old to be sitting here, with you… longing for you to hold me again. But age never bothered me before…)_

"Ninety-two." he sighs.

Far too old. And yet, after spending twenty years in the fearsome darkness with nothing but his own mind and nightmares to haunt him, he feels weary, ready to accept that his life is not the reason this world turns. He gazes into green, understanding eyes _(so different now than the lifeless eyes from before_)

Harry sits down next to him, fingers caressing his face again. (_younger hands, making that gesture for the first time_) How strange, that he would remember such a thing so vividly… "Why** now**? Twenty-two years is hardly an anniversary." He breaths, not sure his voice is loud enough to be heard.

"Twenty-five is." Harry answers softly.

Voldemort merely stares at Harry for a few seconds before comprehension dawns on him, and the face of the man before him, wearing an expression so similar to the one he'd worn in the garden that day, merges with his memories. (_hesitant smiles, black hair flying everywhere as Harry had shaken his head when laughing, lips finally daring to touch the boy's forehead to bid him goodnight) _He starts to tremble, not able to stop as he lunges forwards and presses his face against the warm body in front of him. His teeth find flesh to stop the scream that threatens to tear his throat apart, but there is nothing to stop the tears that cascade from his eyes or the shivers that wrack his body.

"Tom,** Tom**." Harry exclaims, alarmed. "Tom, stop it!"

_(Words written on tear-stained paper, the paper torn at places where the point of the quill had scratched through forcefully. The evidence of his betrayal, black on white.) _

How had he ever been able to justify taking the life of the one who'd given him everything just to save his miserable self?

Someone throws the door open, but neither of them pays attention to the people storming inside. His fingers pluck at the robes, desperate to hold the other now he's finally within reach again. Harry gives up the attemps to calm him down and merely holds him tightly as his muffled screams echo against the walls. He doesn't see the wand that is being pointed at him, and his only warning before he blacks out is Harry's 'No!'

* * *

Sleep… how long has it been since he had a peaceful sleep, without blood running down his arms and aching muscles? He almost can't stand the softness he is lying on when he awakens. It feels strange, wrong. He opens his eyes slightly, only to immediately clench them shut again. Even the shadows seem too bright for him.

"Is he awake?" a gruff voice asks, and slightly callused fingers stroke his cheek a second later.

"Yes, but let him rest a bit longer please."

"Harry, why are you doing this? Why couldn't you just let the monster rot in his cell for the rest of his life like he deserves?"

"You don't understand Ron." Harry answers. "The Minister left the choice to me, but… I did not imprison him for the crimes he committed against others, but his betrayal of me personally. And I recently found out a whole lot more about that which I didn't know before. I… I couldn't leave him there. Not now."

"You should have." Voldemort speaks, before coughing. His throat feels sore from all the talking yesterday and the tears have dried, leaving unpleasant sand-like grains in the corners of his eyes.

"Don't move." Harry says, alarmed when he tries to get up, and warm hands push him back gently.

"Harry… you know I always trusted your judgment…" the other man speaks. "But isn't this a bit… mental? To dig up the one being that tried to make this world hell?"(_Hell. His vision of the world was one of destruction. Burning people, burning houses… And for what?_) Harry sighs deeply, and Voldemort studies the creases in his former lover's face. The voices in his own head are vague now, finally giving him the opportunity to really notice the world around him. "And moreover, what will you** do** with him?"

"I don't** know** Ron!" Harry suddenly exclaims, turning away and putting his head in his hands. "I didn't think, I know… I just… I **had** to get him out!"

"Why!"

"Because I love him!" Harry yells, stopping abruptly after, looking shocked at Ron. (_Weasley. He remembers something about the Weasleys… Didn't some of them die because of him?)_ Ron stares back, gawking.

"You have some explaining to do." the man says, and mechanically walks out of the room, closing the door softly behind him.

"Well shit." Harry mutters, voicing both their thoughts.

"You should go after him." Voldemort advises the man, but Harry shakes his head.

"No. I won't be able to look him in the eyes now. Shit. Twenty-five years of silence and now… How could I be so **stupid** as to let that slip?"

(_Silence… he remembers the fights they had about that. The yelling always ended up in passionate kisses, but that never really solved anything, only shoved the issue away._)

He winces as he moves an arm and one of his wrists rubs against the sheets. pulling it out from under the blankets, he inspects the rough skin up close. The blood has dried, but years of chafing did a lot of damage to them. Harry gently takes it, bringing it to his lips as if they haven't not seen each other for what seems a lifetime, as if nothing ever happened to separate them. "I can heal them if you want…" the man says, frowning as he looks at the injured wrist.

"I do hope your healing spells got better, because if not I prefer dunking them in acid." Voldemort remarks dryly, and Harry laughs.

"Oh Merlin, I used to be horrible at it didn't I? Ohhh, do you remember that one time when I was so stupid to try and heal my own broken rib?"

"And ended up with a punctured lung." the other sighs. "Yes, I remember."

"I'll never be a star healer, but I'm decent at it now." Harry grins. "It's good to know that you haven't lost your sense of humour." he adds, now smiling softly.

"It is a good way to keep my thoughts from dwelling on the past years." Voldemort admits, and the atmosphere instantly changes. Harry fidgets, clearly not knowing what to say to fill the silence, so in the end Voldemort decides to break it before Harry decides to leave.

"How… how has your life been? I don't have much to tell myself but you…"

"After… after the war I decided to become an Auror." Harry says, and coughs with embarrassment. "I actually tried my hardest to get things back as they were." Other than the man in front of him might think, he isn't disappointed. How could he, when he always knew that Harry was with him **despite** what he did and stood for, instead of because of it? Harry never agreed with him on many points, and tried to avoid the topics of Muggles, the Order and the war in general as much as he could when they were together. He hadn't really expected him to do anything else. "I've also picked up Quidditch again… I've been a guest player at several matches, though I'll never choose a team. And for the rest… I don't know, I don't think I've done anything note-worthy… trying to live my life, which was a lot harder than people around me thought. You'll be happy to know that I am not seeing anyone."

He is more relieved than he feels he deserves at hearing that particular piece of information, and tries to sit up once again. This time Harry doesn't protest or try to push him back, instead helping him to sit straight with as little pain as possible. Harry, remembering his earlier promise, takes his wand and heals the major external wounds.

"Did you try?" Voldemort asks while the other is busy cleaning up the dried blood.

"Hmm?"

"To… have others."

"I tried with a few… never men again though. I tried telling myself that it was because you hurt me and I didn't want to feel so vulnerable again, but I really just think that I was unwilling to give myself fully to another when knowing you wouldn't like it." Harry smiled one of his rare, half-sad smiles that still manage to reach his eyes and give a sparkle to them. "Maybe I knew that one day you'd be back."

"Harry… you realise that I can't stay, do you? They will demand of you to place me back in Azkaban." He closes his eyes and involuntary curls up into himself when mentioning the hated prison with its guardians. (_faceless heads, rattling sounds, the chill that precedes their presence. The rotten smell, crusty hands that reach in the darkness…)_

"They can't."

The simple, short sentence cuts through him like a knife, and for a heavenly moment he believes it, before he lets out a wry laugh. harry, however, isn't done yet, and places a hand on his cheek, leaning down so he is forced to look in his former lover's eyes. "They** can't** Tom. Only I have that power. It is the one thing I asked from them, to be fully responsible for you. Your punishment is in my hands."

"Why." he breathes, an invisible fist clenching around a heart he thought long gone.

"Because I betrayed them first. Even though I knew how wrong you were in your views… even though I knew of the slaughter and cruelty…" Voldemort clenches his jaw, displeased to have it put like that, but he keeps silent, knowing that he would never have another chance to show Harry and the rest of the world how much better everything would have been with the changes he wanted. "And even through that, I still chose you, and to ignore everything else, so I figured that when everything turned on me, it was my punishment and burden to bear."

"Oh Harry." the man says, not knowing how to comfort someone else when he himself is so broken. Silent tears of past pain glitter in the other man's eyes as he ducks his head in shame, and Voldemort awkwardly reaches out, wrapping bony arms around the man. It is a delightful feeling to have Harry in his arms again, and his breath catches in his throat when Harry responds and snuggles closer to his chest, propping his head underneath Voldemort's chin. "I wish I had never been so selfish and spared you all this pain." the man somberly states.

"But it happened. You did it, and even though now I know that you didn't **want** to and honestly loved me, it still hurts that you made your life a priority over mine, when the possibility of you dying was infinitesimal, whereas a killing curse fired directly at me…"

"Apparently also didn't kill you." Voldemort finished the sentence.

"You didn't know that." Harry surly replies, but he doesn't pull away, instead unconsciously tracing a bony spine with his index finger, only stopping, his face blushing, when Voldemort lets out a soft, low moan. "I don't know what to do." Harry thickly says. "I could never lock you up again while knowing **this**, but I also can't let you live freely. I know you, you would try again and again until you succeed at whatever you want, and I can't allow that. Also, I'm an Auror, and cannot excuse your crimes as easily as I could before, but by god do I still love you."

What should he say? What** could** he say, to this man, who had given him everything and was ready to do the same again now, even while knowing the possibility of being used was there even this time? Not that he would. He had tried to repent in his prison, using the brief moments of time that he wasn't sinking into madness to reflect on his inner self, go over past mistakes… And curse himself for ruining the life of one so pure as Harry Potter.

Someone knocks harshly on the door, demanding Harry to come out, and the man hurriedly gets up, only turning when Voldemort calls out to him again, after which he has to wait a minute to recover from severe coughing that follows till he can speak normally again.

"I want you to know that, through everything… I have never ceased to love you too, my Harry."

A flash of** something** crosses those beautiful eyes before Harry turns his head away and steps through the door opening.

He sinks back in the pillows, staring blankly at the wooden ceiling, tracing the patterns with his eyes. He tries not to think too much, but while Harry's presence had willed away most of that nagging voice in the back of his mind, it comes back full force now. When closing his eyes, he sees the people that have fallen at his hand, his followers who betrayed him one by one, and the horrible, last duel plays in his head. It hadn't even been much of a duel, really. Harry had merely… stood there.  
(_Awaiting the curse, shoulders slumped in defeat as he realises how fooled he's been, the will to live in his eyes dying with each insult thrown his way_)

Voldemort breathes in deeply, listening to the harsh, but indecipherable words on the other side of the door. He images Harry, trying to defend himself and his former lover. Trying to explain something they don't want to hear. Imagines how they don't listen to those words, trying to talk sense into him. And isn't that their good right? Why should he, the monster every witch and wizard grew up to fear, receive love from this man, the epitome of mercy? And now they'll send him back to that hell… no matter what Harry says, the world would never agree to him running loose.

But when Harry storms in again, followed by two of his friends, his eyes are sparkling with joy instead of anger.

"We can go." Harry says. "But we will never return."

* * *

An old man sits on a white bench, a replica of one that was destroyed ages ago when his home was attacked. He gazes at the familiar mountains around him and smiles when seeing the tops are covered in white. He can practically hear his bones creak when he shifts his arm, making sure the thin piece of wood he always carries with him is still there, a paranoid habit that never went away after he got a new one. He shakes his head to clear it from the flash of an image of times long buried. _Two broken halves…_ He hums pervasively to forget about it, but when he finds that the song, a school's anthem, makes him remember even more unwanted memories, he sighs, fingering the piece of paper he has written, saddened by the knowledge it will soon become tear-stain.

Finally, he moves, using his hands and arms to crawl from the bench, clenching his jaws as he moves on hands and knees through the grass until he reaches the old yew tree they planted when coming here. He keeps his eyes closed to not see the small cottage in front of him and points his wand.

* * *

_I sometimes wonder if it were real, that time. The years I ruled the world, haunted it as a spirit, came back to life and finally fell into a dark, cold loneliness after three meager years of victory. It seems a dream. An improbable, terrifying nightmare. A dream from which I awoke sixty years ago, and fled._

_Reflecting now upon the life after, I realise how bleak it was compared to that dream, not filled with adventures, monsters or power. It almost surprises me that it was so fulfilling. After all, while being revered and feared as a God, I have been confined to this valley for all of my life. And yet… now I gaze at these mountains, knowing it will be the last time I see them, I realise how much I loved the life I led here._

_Of course, I could decide to stay longer, but I am not afraid of death anymore. After living with my love for so long I have learned to appreciate life, but also learned how to accept that it must end one day. This day._

_I know, my love, that you will read this in sadness, but I hope you can understand my decision. Twenty years of imprisonment were enough to leave me broken, and I do not want that again. While our bedroom can hardly count as a second Azkaban, -a name that still makes my fingers tremble as I try to put it on paper-, I could not bear to be confined to it, to be bedridden, knowing that there is an outside I cannot return to, only look at from behind bars._

_But perhaps you already understood my decision… You saw me struggle to get out of the house after the healer's diagnosis, knowing your wand wasn't in its usual place. And now I'm here, sitting in the garden, for the last time looking at the Muggle village in the distance that we protected in exchange for secrecy, at the valley we called home the past decades._

_I can only hope that you have locked yourself up in the living room, so you will not be able to see the green flash or the words that I will speak soon._

_Goodbye, my love. I am undeserving of all that you gave me. It was an honour to have known you, to have loved you and to be saved by you._

_Tom._

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Ohhh merlin, present tense is hard to write... I kept falling back in past tense, as that is what I use in all my other stories, and then I had to go back and edit everything -.-'' So.. sorry if there are still mistakes somewhere if I accidentally used past tense where I shouldn't.

Read and Review!

xx elfin


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